


Bridges Crossed and Fair Maidens Won

by out_there



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-26
Updated: 2013-02-26
Packaged: 2017-12-03 16:35:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/700400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/out_there/pseuds/out_there
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“She’s a fairy, not an elf,” Charlie says. “And I asked for help to get a message to her.  Organize a date.  Not spend the rest of my life crossing the spookiest bridge in the Midwest.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bridges Crossed and Fair Maidens Won

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the 2013 Picfor1000 challenge. My inspiration picture is [here](http://www.flickr.com/photos/randolphknackstedt/5387306882/lightbox/).
> 
> Thanks to my beta, Oxoniensis who has such a wonderful ear for character voices. After seeing Charlie and Dean onscreen together in “LARP and the Real Girl”, I wanted to see more of them hanging out. Sometimes, you need to be the change you want to see in the world – or more accurately, you need to write the stories you want to read.

If you ask Dean, there’s something a little too appropriate about the setting. Roiling dark clouds above windswept corn fields are creepy enough without the occasional burst of lightning illuminating an abandoned farmhouse in the distance. He grips the wooden rail tighter.

“Doesn’t the bridge feel like overkill to you?” Dean asks, stepping across the weathered boards carefully. Looks are deceiving. This bridge might look like it’s stood for a hundred years, but that doesn’t make it solid. It looks as if it cuts across this field forever, but Dean knows that can’t be possible.

Beside him, Charlie shrugs. She keeps her hand on the other railing. “In a creepy field, there was a creepy bridge, and at the end of that bridge, there was a creepy house. I think I read that book as a kid.”

“Is that the one with Elmo at the end?” Dean wouldn’t ask if Sam had come; Sammy would tease him about it, ask how Dean knows about Muppets and kids stories. The truth is Sam's the reason he knows. It's Sam who wanted bedtime stories as a kid, and their dad wasn’t the type to read picture books even if they were Sam’s favorite.

The kind of bedtime stories their dad told used to give Sammy nightmares. Dean thought they were cool.

***

“We’ve been walking forever,” Charlie calls out, pitching her voice loud enough to carry over the wind whipping her red hair around her face. “I think this wind’s getting worse.”

“This was your bright idea,” Dean yells back.

“No, it wasn’t!”

Dean keeps moving forward, stepping carefully with his eyes narrowed against the gusts. “You were the one who said the elf princess—”

“Fairy,” Charlie says snippily.

“Excuse me?” Dean asks, more surprised than insulted. Given that Charlie likes girls even more than he does, it’s not the sort of insult he’d expect her to use. Usually, she insults him like Sam insults him: calls him a bitch or tells him to man up. Dean’s a lot more comfortable with that.

“She’s a fairy, not an elf,” Charlie says. “And I asked for help to get a message to her. Organize a date. Not spend the rest of my life crossing the spookiest bridge in the Midwest.”

Dean really hopes it doesn’t take the rest of their lives. The rest of his life should include beer, women and the radio blasting in the Impala.

***

They’re still walking and the pointed roof of the farmhouse hasn’t gotten any closer. The clouds are looming overhead but at least the wind’s died down. They can talk without having to yell.

“I think it gets a bad rap,” Charlie’s saying, head tilted and brow quirked as she thinks. “If more girls tried it, I’m sure they wouldn’t be so anti-porn.”

They’re discussing favorite porn stars and Belladonna’s hottest films. This is why Charlie is the coolest girl Dean knows, but that’s not much of a compliment. These days, there aren’t many girls Dean could call friends: usually he’s slept with them, or broken their hearts, or they’ve died. Sometimes it’s two out of three.

Dean shakes the thought away. “So, given your expansive collection of good porn…”

“Please. Fifty videos saved to my laptop is not expansive.” Charlie shrugs, grinning. “Totes normal.”

“It’s kind of awesome,” Dean says, because she really is the coolest chick ever. “Have you already planned the scenes you and Little Miss Fairy will be playing out?”

“Firstly, it’s demeaning and rude to ask that about a girl I haven’t gotten to second base with. Secondly, is that a wise thing to joke about while we literally walk into her magical kingdom?”

Dean rolls his eyes. “Killjoy.”

***

“What is the point of a bridge if you can’t get to the other side?”

Dean shrugs. “To stop you getting there? That’s what Sam said.” Sam actually used phrases like “a test of endurance and intention” but he’d also thought the bridge was more likely a mental challenge than a physical one. Dean’s aching feet are proving him wrong right now.

“Wait,” Charlie says, and for the first time in hours, they stop walking. It doesn’t stop Dean’s feet from throbbing in his boots. “Are we missing something?”

“The Land of Faerie lies beyond the bridge,” Dean repeats dutifully. “Those seeking it must be pure of intent, and faithful in courage, and blah-blah-blah, medieval stuff written by guys who never got laid. You want fairy-girl? Cross the bridge, or give up and quit whining.”

“We’ve been walking for—” Charlie lifts her wrist and pulls back her sleeve. Her wristwatch is bright blue and made of that cheap-looking plastic that’s weirdly expensive. “Hours. We have literally been walking all night, not that you could tell from the light here.”

She’s right. This place looks like permanent midnight. “And your point is…?”

“We’re still no closer.” Frowning, Charlie pulls her hand off the railing. Her eyes scan the endlessly flat horizon, settling on the distant farmhouse.

“Thank you, Captain Obvious.”

“The Land of Faerie lies beyond the bridge. Not over it or on the other side. Beyond,” Charlie says slowly. Then she places two hands on the railing, and climbs up. Wide-eyed, she pulls a face at Dean and hauls her other leg over. “This will either be awesome, or really stupid,” she says and drops to the cornfield.

She disappears before she hits the ground.

***

It’s been ten minutes, but the last time he went rushing after Charlie, he got bitched out for interrupting the girl-on-girl action. So Dean stands on the bridge, watching the sky clear to a pale, wintery blue. The fields around him sway in the warm breeze, shimmering green and gold in the weak sunlight. Dean hopes that means someone was glad to see Charlie.

A note flutters down to his feet. It’s a page ripped out of a notebook, the one from Charlie’s pocket, and it reads, “Epically awesome. I owe you one.”

Dean marks that as a success.


End file.
